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6ixGod said:
The thing with China is first off they are incredibly disciplined people and second they’ve done it so many times now (replicated their public transport systems in various cities) that’s it’s become muscle memory for them.

Over time I would expect Metrolinx to start functioning like a well oiled machine. But it seems like they keep tripping over one coffee table after another.
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It's like with the RCN and warship procurement. We assemble the various parts and people to get the project planned, designed and executed, but once it's done the parts and people are dispersed and we start all over again, losing any learnings. I wonder if anyone who worked on the O-Train is now working on the Crosstown? It seems to me that every ML project is dealt with in isolation.
 
Admiral Beez said:
It's like with the RCN and warship procurement. We assemble the various parts and people to get the project planned, designed and executed, but once it's done the parts and people are dispersed and we start all over again, losing any learnings. I wonder if anyone who worked on the O-Train is now working on the Crosstown? It seems to me that every ML project is dealt with in isolation.
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If they had in-house engineering and design expertise, they’d at least retain best practices between projects and maintain institutional knowledge.

Of course you outsource the construction itself, and specific pre-construction work like surveying and soil sampling. But turning everything over to various one-off consortiums is a terrible way to go.
 
ShonTron said:
Of course you outsource the construction itself, and specific pre-construction work like surveying and soil sampling. But turning everything over to various one-off consortiums is a terrible way to go.
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IDK, if you keep a constant build the construction workers (or at least a core group) themselves can become ML employees. We can thus eliminate the construction firm margins, and a lot of that shady dealing in the background.
 
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6ixGod said:
The thing with China is first off they are incredibly disciplined people and second they’ve done it so many times now (replicated their public transport systems in various cities) that’s it’s become muscle memory for them.

Over time I would expect Metrolinx to start functioning like a well oiled machine. But it seems like they keep tripping over one coffee table after another.
Click to expand...
Not having to worry about silly little trifles like human rights or safety standards certainly hasn't hurt them, either.
 
T3G said:
Not having to worry about silly little trifles like human rights or safety standards certainly hasn't hurt them, either.
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You know, much as there may be some truth in your remarks, in some small way, this is not a statement that should be thrown out as a shot without some reference to actual data.

When I went googling for information on "chinese workers killed in high speed rail construction", the headlines mostly are about Chinese workers killed while working on projects elsewhere in Asia. It's pretty obvious that China has a huge workforce of people with skills and experience in building high speed rail, which they deploy not only to their own needs but to make money building other countries' lines also.

China is pretty capable of building railways, it's us who aren't - and differences in safety standards or working conditions for workers is likely a much smaller factor in their success than your statement would imply.

And if you google "high speed rail accidents", you get incidents in Germany, Spain, etc.... which begs some curiosity for data on number of fatalities per million passenger miles. I bet that statistically, China may not run much less safe than any other country.

I would bet the number of Chinese workers killed during construction of their high speed lines, while perhaps not zero, is far less than the number of Chinese workers killed during construction of the CPR.

So, if they have found ways of reducing red tape, perhaps we should imitate. I'm not defending China's system of government, nor advocating for lower safety standards - but let's keep balance and be guided by data.

Can you cite data ?

- Paul
 
crs1026 said:
You know, much as there may be some truth in your remarks, in some small way, this is not a statement that should be thrown out as a shot without some reference to actual data.

When I went googling for information on "chinese workers killed in high speed rail construction", the headlines mostly are about Chinese workers killed while working on projects elsewhere in Asia. It's pretty obvious that China has a huge workforce of people with skills and experience in building high speed rail, which they deploy not only to their own needs but to make money building other countries' lines also.

China is pretty capable of building railways, it's us who aren't - and differences in safety standards or working conditions for workers is likely a much smaller factor in their success than your statement would imply.

And if you google "high speed rail accidents", you get incidents in Germany, Spain, etc.... which begs some curiosity for data on number of fatalities per million passenger miles. I bet that statistically, China may not run much less safe than any other country.

I would bet the number of Chinese workers killed during construction of their high speed lines, while perhaps not zero, is far less than the number of Chinese workers killed during construction of the CPR.

So, if they have found ways of reducing red tape, perhaps we should imitate. I'm not defending China's system of government, nor advocating for lower safety standards - but let's keep balance and be guided by data.

Can you cite data ?

- Paul
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You do realize that the CCP controls EVERYTHING including what information is released to the public and what the rest of the world hears...

There is a reason why you haven't found any examples of Chinese workers being killed within China.
 
It's off-topic but if there are swaths of Chinese workers being killed constructing infrastructure we would hear about it, just as we hear about their plane crashes and mines collapsing.

en.wikipedia.org

China Eastern Airlines Flight 5735 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

List of coal mining accidents in China - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

It takes a severe level of cope to say that China is only able to build the most extensive HSR network in the world because they abuse their workers and turn the other way if some die. That sort of activity is certainly prevalent in the Middle East but it's more likely than not that China simply got good at building infrastructure and we refuse to do the same here.

Edit - I say "got good" as if it wasn't Chinese workers doing some of the most strenuous work building our own national railway system, but that's definitely an aside.
 
This whole China does it better is bordering on racism with ridiculous claims made. China is generally a non-capitalist country and can justify spending huge amounts of government money without fearing that the stock market will react negatively.
China also has no real rule of law, so any labour protections that do exist are likely not enforced. It’s very easy to build things when worker protections and fair pay don’t have to be acknowledged.
China also requires any foreign company to partner with a local firm and share intellectual property. It’s not even close to level playing field with the West.
 
asher__jo said:
China also has no real rule of law, so any labour protections that do exist are likely not enforced. It’s very easy to build things when worker protections and fair pay don’t have to be acknowledged.
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As someone who deals with Chinese manufacturing on a daily basis, I can assure that that this is not the case.

Dan
 
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